


Evening

by StAnni



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst, Complicated Relationships, F/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:47:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24604168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StAnni/pseuds/StAnni
Summary: “Are we ever going to have a life, Selina?”  He asks and she sits down next to him, eyes even – thinking of the best way to throw him a lifeline. “This is the life we have, Bruce.”  She says finally, and it is honest, and painful.  “I’d rather have this, than not have it.”  She finishes, the strength in her voice wavering for just a second, a rare glimpse of her insecurity.
Relationships: Selina Kyle/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 1
Kudos: 29





	Evening

He doesn’t know exactly where she is staying these days, only that she went for nine days straight without a word to him in the past month. It caused some friction when she resurfaced but eventually he decided to grit his teeth and get through it – she’d never change. 

That he knows. 

She’ll never change and things will never change and these walls he keeps on slamming into are there for good, rooted to the core.   
He tries anyway, because he’s nothing if not persistent. “Move in with me.” “Live with me.” “Stay” he says, over and over – sliding his fingers between hers, closing them and pulling her close. 

She never gives in. 

Sometimes he sulks and she’ll bite back in irritation, quick as frost “See, you can’t even handle me. How do you want to live with me?” And sometimes, when he is angrier than he is disappointed he’ll not leave either, and retort, just as coldly “ Then stop coming around, Selina. Let me have my life then.” 

And then sometimes she does leave, and he worries and wonders if it really is for good. 

But right now they’re fine or they’re alright, at least. Right now she saunters into his study with a smirk that is Selina at sixteen, and chuckles when he closes the file on his desk and slips it into the drawer at his knee. She leans over and grabs at his wrist. “Why can’t I see it?” She teases and he, quickly catching her wrist with his own hand, holds her gently at bay as he teases with even honesty “Because you’re a bad guy.” And she laughs at that, happily, flicks her wrist out of his hold easily and slides around the desk with devious dexterity. “And what are you? A white knight?” 

Later that night on the worn leather of the couch he moves over her and she regards him quietly – her face dark in his shadow. His fingers curl through hers and he presses her palms down above her shoulders, putting weight there until she breathes out, arching her back just slightly against his chest. “What’s on your mind?” She asks because she knows him, every seam of him, inside and out. “Stay here.” He says, again, and she blinks away from his eyes, turn her head to the side – her fingers moving against his grip. “Okay, enough.” She says, the steel of irritation creeping into her voice, and he lets go of the hand she is looking at, shifting up so that she can move. She doesn’t move right away, but he allows her space to sit up, and so does he – they face each other – except her eyes are everywhere else. “What were you looking at before?” She asks, deflecting, glancing at him as if nothing just happened – it is so typical Selina that it automatically irks the permanent bed of frustration at his core and he doesn’t answer and leans away – reaching for his shirt. To her credit she is used to the dance, sighs quietly behind him and switches gears “Have you heard from Alfred?” 

He glances over his shoulder as he pulls on his shirt and the ghosts of her fingers trail on his side almost absently, “He’s with friends. He’s doing well.” Her legs move in front of him and he hasn’t even heard that she got up from the couch. She pushes his shoulders back and he tips his head up to look at her, setting his jaw, guarding himself. Of course she sees this right away and flicks at his cheek. “Don’t be so moody, Bruce.” She tries evenly and he catches her finger and then her hand on the second flick with his own “Stop that.”  
She feels guilty and it is easy to see – her telltale switch from irritation to soothing – and that in turn makes him feel guilty too. It’s no good, the two of them, and he looks down as she pulls her to him, his forehead touching the concave of her naked stomach. “Come on, cheer up.” She says “Let’s just not think for a while.” 

It is easy, it really is, to wipe everything away – to pretend that they are untethered, floating instead of sinking, and he lifts his face to her smooth skin and breathes against the cool stretch of skin beneath her breast as she sighs. She trails her hands to his jaw and tilts his head up as she bends down for a searing kiss that has him pulling her back down on top of him. 

When she covers him, her net cast wide and her eyes sharp but soft with love, or the closes approximation to love – he knows that even if things never change, should she leave he would follow her, should she die he would follow her. When she covers him and her breath moves from her lips to his, his world is shattered to a single point, a single person, unwilling as she is. 

Their movements are unrestrained, rougher than usual and it is as if she can feel him holding back frustration as she tries to claw it out of him. When he flips them over and hitch her knee over his shoulder she gasps at the force of behind his thrust. His fingers dig into the skin at her thigh and he has to bite his tongue, close his eyes, not to increase his velocity. She pulls at his heck, meeting his rhythm and breaks the skin of his lower lip with her teeth. It lasts longer than he believed he had in him for a second round and when he can feel himself stuttering over the edge he pulls her to him, holds her down and pushes deep into her as he releases himself in a hoarse groan. 

And as it always is, the very moment that they part, the second that they separate – the veil falls back over the world and it is as if he can feel his chest caving in.

She is as naked as the truth and walks out of the room to the kitchen. In the minute that she is not there he tries to imagine being with someone else, anyone else – but he can’t. As he pulls on his pants he sees a glint of black on the wooden floor and picks up a button from her jacket. He slides it into his pocket just before she comes back with a glass of water in a hand outstretched. 

“It’s cold, right?” She asks, almost absently, and leans down to get her jacket from the side of the couch. He watches her nods, sitting down again with the glass and she blinks at him, recognizing the shift in his demeanor. “Come on, Bruce. Don’t go back down yet.” 

So he’ll be thirty four in a week and here he is running after the same girl, years and years later. He’ll be without the things he wanted – he will not have a wife, or kids. He’d have a life compromised down to the barest minimum of emotional satisfaction - a drawer full of bobby pins, scarves, gloves that he has pilfered from her over a lifetime, the ring she gave back, the scars they gave each other. His dismal mood plummets fast.

They both know that sex used to work, it was the easiest way to smooth the waters after an argument, to turn a frown upside down. They both know that it doesn’t anymore, that it might just make things worse.

“Are we ever going to have a life, Selina?” He asks and she sits down next to him, eyes even – thinking of the best way to throw him a lifeline. “This is the life we have, Bruce.” She says finally, and it is honest, and painful. “I’d rather have this, than not have it.” She finishes, the strength in her voice wavering for just a second, a rare glimpse of her insecurity. 

She could have left, he knows. She has had many opportunities to leave Gotham, to start a better life somewhere. And it is not as if he is offering her anything that she would find enticing. She hates the public life that he chooses to lead, she is bored by politics, she is unable to suffer the galas and soirees. It is not as if he offers her anything that would get them closer to a family, to normal. For her to change he’d have to change – and that, they know, is impossible. So she stays, he knows, in Gotham for him, even if it is not at his side.

“You bum me out when you get like this.” She sighs next to him, her knee a gentle pressure against his thigh. “Then I must bum you out a lot.” He smirks and instantly she catches his smile, reels him in with a wide, soft smile of her own. “Par for the course, I guess.”


End file.
